"Oh, no; he always does it," returned Dido, (the unsuspicious,) pulling out a little drawer as she spoke.
"See! I have only three shillings, till after to-morrow, and these Murphys declare they can't wait any longer than Monday—they are pressed themselves, and Darby says they must be paid. To hear him talk, one would think I had only to go out and pick up sovereigns on the gravel!"
"Then let uncle pay," said Helen sternly, "it's not more than the price of one of his old books. I do think, Dido, that it is rather hard that you should have to work for the support of the whole family, and that all the income from the place goes, I may say, on air! Barry told me that, even as it is, it brings in a thousand a year."
Dido made no immediate answer, but sat resting her chin on her hand, and gazing fixedly out of the window. At length she seemed to have come to some settled decision, for she rose and said, "I think I will try the Padré once more; it's rather a forlorn hope, but nothing venture, nothing have. Wait here till I come back, Helen," and with a melancholy little nod she quitted the room.
Helen sat down in her cousin's chair in front of the old bureau, with its inky baize desk, and numerous musty drawers; and noted with feelings of hot indignation, the traces of Dido's tears—tears that had splashed unchecked upon the leaves of an open account-book. Sitting here before these tear-stained columns, she asked herself dispassionately if a man who had brought forth nothing but second-hand inventions, after forty years of costly experiments, was likely to revolutionize the universe at last?
No, she had no patience with his concentrated selfishness, and no faith in the apparatus. As to Darby Chute, she had never trusted him, and although she had no solid grounds for her suspicions, yet she could not divest herself of the idea, that he was a rascal! She was aware that Darby did not eye her with any favour, and indeed he had more than once made craftily-veiled inquiries as to when she was going away?
"It was no use," said Dido, entering the room, and shaking her head hopelessly. "I knew it. He just held up empty hands. That is his invariable answer when I beg for a little money. It will just have to be, as Darby says," sitting down, and looking at her cousin despondently, "we must sell the white cow."
"Not the one I call my cow; not Daisy?" cried Helen in consternation.
"Yes; she is the best of them all. She will fetch the most money. Darby thinks we might get twenty pounds for her at the fair to-morrow. There is no use in putting off the evil day, and I hate to owe a penny. I cannot sleep if I am in debt."
"You should see what some girls owe, and how they sleep," said her cousin, thinking of the Miss Platts, and how very lightly their milliner's accounts lay on their minds. "Is there no resource but Daisy? Can you suggest nothing else?"